Workflow - Reformulating Suggesting Modifications
Are the commentators of suggested modifications allowed to suggest reformulations of the original formulations?
As the members of the community comment on suggested modifications, new formulations are sometimes offered by the commentators. These reformulations are sometimes deemed advantageous by the community and can lead to a communal consensus. The question is whether such reformulations are allowed in the scientonomic workflow and, if so, how they should be handled in practice, including how, if at all, these reformulations should be published and who should get the authorship of these reformulations.
In the scientonomic context, this question was first formulated by Hakob Barseghyan and Jamie Shaw in 2019. The question is currently accepted as a legitimate topic for discussion by Scientonomy community.
In Scientonomy, the accepted answer to the question is:
- The commentators of suggested modifications are allowed to suggest reformulations of the original formulations in the comments. By default, the new formulation should bear the original author’s name, unless the author decides to give credit to those who significantly contributed to the new reformulation.
Contents
Scientonomic History
Acceptance Record of the Question
| Community | Accepted From | Acceptance Indicators | Still Accepted | Accepted Until | Rejection Indicators |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scientonomy | 22 December 2019 | The publication of Shaw and Barseghyan (2019) is and indication of the acceptance of the question. | Yes |
All Direct Answers
| Theory | Formulation | Formulated In |
|---|---|---|
| Allow Modification Reformulations (Shaw-Barseghyan-2019) | The commentators of suggested modifications are allowed to suggest reformulations of the original formulations in the comments. By default, the new formulation should bear the original author’s name, unless the author decides to give credit to those who significantly contributed to the new reformulation. | 2019 |
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Accepted Direct Answers
| Community | Theory | Formulation | Accepted From | Accepted Until |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scientonomy | Allow Modification Reformulations (Shaw-Barseghyan-2019) | The commentators of suggested modifications are allowed to suggest reformulations of the original formulations in the comments. By default, the new formulation should bear the original author’s name, unless the author decides to give credit to those who significantly contributed to the new reformulation. | 25 February 2023 |
Suggested Modifications
| Modification | Community | Date Suggested | Summary | Date Assessed | Verdict | Verdict Rationale |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sciento-2019-0003 | Scientonomy | 22 December 2019 | Accept that the commentators of suggested modifications are allowed to suggest reformulations of the original formulations. Also accept that, by default, the new formulation should bear the original author’s name, unless the author decides to give credit to those who significantly contributed to the new reformulation. This should be decided collegially by the author, the commentators, and the editors on a case-by-case basis. | 25 February 2023 | Accepted | The decision was made during the 2023 scientonomy workshop. It was noted that the idea is compatible with other consensus systems where one is allowed to modify the proposal in order to reach consensus. The modification sparked important discussion about our iterative process. Paul Patton highlighted a potential problem with our workflow where, by the time we are discussing acceptance, the paper has already been formatted and published. He raised a question if it might be more advisable to use a two-stage process, where a paper is first posted in some preliminary form and then, following the debate on acceptance, it is reformulated as needed and the final version is considered published. Hakob Barseghyan responded that there always has to be a chance of commenting on something published post factum. Instead of the two-step process, he suggested allowing small alterations to modifications after the publication and publishing the commentaries to modifications in a separate article (as the community just accepted with modification 2019-0002), while leaving the original article intact. Greg Rupik also suggested the potential for a special designation for a tweaked modification identifier (e.g. 2019-0003a instead of 2019-0003) to make it more apparent which modifications were reformulated. Barseghyan responded that the wiki is well-suited to make reformulations apparent (most specifically, in the Preamble and Verdict sections) without the need to multiply modifications. He also emphasized that this modification pertains to smaller reformulations and not to significant changes to the content, making some concerns about the modification less immediately relevant. Barseghyan also addressed the question posted prior to the workshop by Ameer Sarwar: when other authors cite a modification that has been altered, what exactly should they cite? Barseghyan suggested that, since both the original modification and the altered one will be published, one can cite both. The modification was accepted unanimously. |
Current View
In Scientonomy, the accepted answer to the question is Allow Modification Reformulations (Shaw-Barseghyan-2019).
Allow Modification Reformulations (Shaw-Barseghyan-2019) states: "The commentators of suggested modifications are allowed to suggest reformulations of the original formulations in the comments. By default, the new formulation should bear the original author’s name, unless the author decides to give credit to those who significantly contributed to the new reformulation."
By allowing the discussants to suggest alternative formulations in their comments, the workflow incentivizes commenting and aids consensus building. It often happens that the discussants agree that a little tweak in the original formulation would solve the problem. This can help speed up the advancement of our communal knowledge. In contrast, when the discussants are not permitted to reformulate the original formulations, the discussants have no other choice than to write a whole new paper arguing for what is otherwise a little tweak to the original formulation. Not only is this wasteful, but it also creates a bottleneck where a consensus formation is postponed due to bureaucratic restrictions. Thus, it is important to remove this bottleneck and allow the participants to alter original formulations.
If a discussion yielded a new formulation, any such formulation should be clearly stated and added to the respective suggested modification, possibly under a separate heading (e.g. by distinguishing “Original Suggestion” from “Final Suggestion”). By default, the new formulation should bear the name of the author(s) of the original suggested modification, unless the original author(s) decides to give credit to those who significantly contributed to the reformulation. This should be decided collegially by the author, the commentators, and the editors on a case-by-case basis.
Related Topics
This question is a subquestion of Scientonomic Workflow.
